The Sermon on the Mount, football and newspapers: an odd trio

1. In honor of Dr. King, it’s nice, every once in a while, to consider what being a Christian means, even if, like me, you aren’t quite one, or even if you aren’t even nearly one.

Sarah Vowell does so in this piece, which throws down a version of the old axiom: Liberals love the Sermon on the Mount, and conservatives love the 10 Commandments.*

Consider this astonishing excerpt:

Here’s what Dr. King got out of the Sermon on the Mount. On Nov. 17, 1957, in Montgomery’s Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, he concluded the learned discourse that came to be known as the “loving your enemies” sermon this way: “So this morning, as I look into your eyes and into the eyes of all of my brothers in Alabama and all over America and over the world, I say to you: ‘I love you. I would rather die than hate you.’ ”

Go ahead and re-read that. That is hands down the most beautiful, strange, impossible, but most of all radical thing a human being can say. And it comes from reading the most beautiful, strange, impossible, but most of all radical civics lesson ever taught, when Jesus of Nazareth went to a hill in Galilee and told his disciples, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you.”

The Bible is a big long book and Lord knows within its many mansions of eccentricity finding justification for literal and figurative witch hunts is as simple as pretending “enhanced investigation technique” is not a synonym for torture. I happen to be with Dr. King in proclaiming the Sermon on the Mount’s call for love to be at the heart of Christian behavior, and one of us got a Ph.D in systematic theology.

Good luck trying to go even 10 minutes abiding by that, but it will be an interesting 10 minutes.

2. My continuing obsession with HBO’s The Wire extends to this desperate point: Last night I abandoned my beloved Packers (second in belovedment to the Pats, of course) to watch the new episode. Oh, and thanks, Packers, for doing so well without me.

As a former employee of Tribune Co., it is delicious for me to hear the plaints on the TV show about what “Chicago” is doing ot the fictionalized newsroom of the Baltimore Sun in the story. Here is an analysis of how it doesn’t quite reflect

It is a reflex of almost all journalists to rail against the powerful, including, and often especially, the ones they work for. And Mr. Simon, who has had success with two brilliant nonfiction books (“Homicide” and “The Corner”) made into television shows, is still a journalist above all. His production company is called Blown Deadline Productions, and he has that chip on the shoulder that makes real reporters so painful to deal with and such a pleasure to read.

But there are other villains in the story of the daily newspaper that do not lend themselves as well to television. A secular shift in consumer habits and a corresponding outflow of advertising has put many papers back on their heels. Mr. Simon and “The Wire” flick at those broader challenges, but the series mostly shows an institution collapsing from within.

The life of an editor now is no longer a matter of just following the story. It’s trying to follow the story while fighting against YouTube and the blogs for readers’ attention, fighting for enough ink and paper after Craigslist and Google have taken their bites out of the budget, and fighting to keep the best reporters who can make better money elsewhere (like television).

Mr. Simon is right: Something is burning. But that doesn’t mean it was an inside job.

3. Oh, by the way? That thing about the Sermon on the Mount and the 10 Commandments? You know what I’m tired of hearing, this election season? The axiom that Democrats fall in love, and Republicans fall in line. It’s exactly the opposite! Republicans are the ones still getting all damp in the trousers over Ronald Reagan, while Democrats can barely stand to think about any of their previous choices. Republicans are the first husband; Democrats are the first wife. (Translation: Guys always think mistily about their exes. Women look back and shudder.)